Remember Sen. Rand Paul’s epic talking filibuster last spring over the government’s use of lethal drone strikes? It lasted a little bit less than 13 hours and garnered him a lot of mainstream- and social-media attention, and it sounds like he feels strongly enough about the resolution on a Syrian strike the White House is hoping to push through Congress that he’s isn’t unwilling to have another go at staging a similar Senatorial showcase. Via National Journal:

Paul was not bullish on his chances of success, however, saying “it would be historic” to stop the authorization, as it has the support of President Obama, Speaker John Boehner, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. “50-50 [odds] might be optimistic,” he said.

Still, Paul vowed to fight on in the Senate. He said that opponents of intervention in Syria, following allegations of chemical-weapons use by the government of President Bashar al-Assad, would almost assuredly push for a 60-vote majority in the Senate. …

“Whether there’s an actual standing filibuster,” he said, “I’ve got to check my shoes” and ability to tame his bladder, which is what ultimately caused the end of his drone filibuster.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid let it be known earlier today that he expects that he’ll have the votes to pass the resolution even if there is a filibuster, but whether that was a serious assessment, or a bullish ploy to make it seem more popular than it really is, remains to be seen. When the resolution does come to a vote, Paul gave us a preview of what a standing filibuster might sound like during the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing earlier today:

This is what happens to career politicians. The people are the least of their concerns. They are padding their wallets at the expense of America and it’s people. Rand Paul is not among them. He is a statesman because he knows history, has a brain to think with and principles to uphold. He is not beholden to the “machine.” A true statesman is a rare figure in the halls of Congress and Senator Paul, I think, is one.

Wow - Kerry would not look up the entire time that Sen Paul was addressing him - not once. He was pretending to write notes, etc but would not look up. Not once.

Isn’t what this regime is about - refusing to acknowledge others’ points of view and attempting ridicule to minimize others’ opinions?

What a sad state we’re in with these morons. We have Russia’s president much closer to the position of Americans. We have Isreal’s head schooling 0dumbo multiple times. We have leaders around the world calling him a coward to put politics above leadership. We have a world falling to pieces on his watch and he lays blame at others’ feet. He gives weapons to drug lords and blames others. He uses the police power of the executive branch in criminal operations and blames others.

This guy is an absolute joke. I hope we survive him and his cabal of morons.

Is Rand Ready? If he does, and is outvoted, and if it goes badly for America—Rand Paul will be the next president of the USA. Imagine if russia starts to release all the stuff they have on Obama? what happens if Iran is pulled in and Israel? I fear things could go badly fast.

Go badly it will, it will be of Biblical proportion too... for these things have been prophesied in the Bible. Isaiah 17:1-2 says "The burden against Damascus. 'Behold, Damascus will cease from being a city, and it will be a ruinous heap". Damascus has existed for over 2,500 yrs and has never become a "ruinous heap" till now. Other prophecies say Israel's surrounding neighbors will attack but Israel will defeat them.

I'm of the belief that if Obama pulls the trigger, we will loose at least one navy vessel and there will be great loss of life and great embarrassment for the US. I also believe these are the last days... turn to God while there is yet time... the US is out of time.

SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY): Madison was very explicit, when he wrote the Federalist papers, he wrote that history supposes, or the constitution supposes what history demonstrates is that the executive is the branch most likely to go to war and therefore the constitution vested that power in the Congress. It is explicit throughout all of Madison's writings. This power is a Congressional power and it is not an executive power. They didn't say big war, small war. They didn't say boots on the ground, not boots on the ground. They said declare war.

That's not exactly correct. The Constitution also empowers Congress to grant letters of Marque and Reprisal.

Many pretend these don't exist, and that they're from a bygone era.

However, what they are are military or covert operations less than war that injure an enemy for reasons of reprisal or national security interest.

So, Congress can grant a letter to pursue an objective that injures an enemy, even militarily, but that is less than war.

13
posted on 09/04/2013 3:56:40 AM PDT
by xzins
( Retired Army Chaplain and Proud of It! Those who truly support our troops pray for victory!)

This is what happens to career politicians. The people are the least of their concerns. They are padding their wallets at the expense of America and its people. Rand Paul is not among them. He is a statesman because he knows history, has a brain to think with and principles to uphold. He is not beholden to the machine. A true statesman is a rare figure in the halls of Congress and Senator Paul, I think, is one.

A Statesman does not offer up an Amnesty plan AS Rand Paul has.

Anyone who offers up an Amnesty plan to provide Amnesty for 30 million+ Undocumented Democrats can only be labeled a Traitor or extremely stupid.

I know Rand Paul is not stupid.

15
posted on 09/04/2013 4:33:36 AM PDT
by SoConPubbie
(Mitt and Obama: They're the same poison, just a different potency)

...If he filibusters on this I think people will start gathering at the Capitol....

This is the path followed by the Left: rule by mob. Whomever is the loudest carries the day. We should avoid such behavior. I am completely sympathetic to Senator Paul's position, but I disagree that a filibuster would be an effective strategy politically or an appropriate course for a duly elected official of this great Republic. Going to war is a grave decision and Congress deserves to have a vote. Denying the people's legislative body the right to express its preference is wrong, and I am certain that the Founding Fathers would not support a parliamentary gimmick to forestall a vote on the most serious question a country can ever pose to itself. The Founding Fathers would not approve of the erection of such a barrier to the legitimate democratic process even though to a man they would condemn this unwarranted incursion in the affairs of another country.

A filibuster allows him and Cruz and others of their persuasion to talk and invite Americans to listen. As long as they can hold the floor uninterrupted. They can inspire and educate.

In the end it does not stop a vote unless there are enough votes to stop one, and Rand Paul knows there won’t be. Reid and the Senate Dems along with the McCain insane faction of “R”s will pass this in the Senate.

They will get to engage because that’s how the Senate is set up.

There will also be a vote, just delayed for a few hours.

Rand filibustered on a nomination, for 13 hrs, in order to demand that the WH clarify its position on the legality of killing Americans in America with Drones, something they had dodged before.

There was then a vote on that nomination after Rand gave up the floor, and that nomination passed overwhelmingly.

Now we have a 21st Century Tonkin Gulf Resolution. There were no Nay votes in the House, and only two Senators voted Nay in the Senate, Wayne Morse of Oregon and Ernst Gruening of Alaska. Morse is a hero of the anti-war left for that vote. I am not a fan of Morse but he was correct in his assessment of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, and Paul is right in his assessment of this obvious fraud.

This is REAL leadership.Can you believe in light of the absolute fact that the Al Qaeda had Sarin and Assad had no reason to gas his own people that rrepuublican leadership want to give obama cover for his gullibility

Considering how the pattern for the last few decades has been each new administration is worse than the one it replaced, you might survive this one only to get something even worse. And be careful tempting fate about saying no one could be worse.

31
posted on 09/04/2013 8:19:08 AM PDT
by Orangedog
(An optimist is someone who tells you to 'cheer up' when things are going his way)

RINOs are the worst type of warmongers. Most are draft-dodgers who have never heard a shot fired in anger. They will send you children off to die in a heart-beat, because they think it’s “patriotic” to support any and all warmongering, whether it be from a republican president or democrat president. They are bloodthirty warmongers of the first degree. Like democrats they think war is but a game, to be played by anyone but them.

"Rand Paul is not among them. He is a statesman because he knows history, has a brain to think with and principles to uphold. He is not beholden to the machine. A true statesman is a rare figure in the halls of Congress and Senator Paul, I think, is one."

....I think you misunderstand. A filibuster allows him and Cruz and others of their persuasion to talk and invite Americans to listen. As long as they can hold the floor uninterrupted. They can inspire and educate....

Perhaps you are right about the strategy, but I think this would be a misuse of the term “filibuster.” To filibuster is to extend debate on a bill to such a length that it consumes all the time in a session allocated to a given matter, thereby delaying a call for a vote on the bill until at least the following session. Debate may be ended by the body with a vote of cloture, requiring at least 60 votes.

The president pro tempore or committee chairman can give deference to a member to allow him to speak for a long time, if that's what he chooses to do. But I don't think he's obligated to, and he has the power to limit time taken by a senator to speak on the floor if he wants to; and he probably would if he thinks that he has the votes for cloture.

Anyway, I don't think Paul can block the parliamentary procedure of the Senate at will. He really needs 60 votes to be able to talk beyond is alloted time. If he has the 60 votes, he can filibuster. But I don't think he should filibuster a vote to take the country to war even if he has the votes for the reasons stated in my previous post.

Our Federal government should be addressing the issues of the vulnerability of our power grid and infrastructure to EMP attack, closing our borders, strengthening our military for defensive use only, abolishing unconstitutional laws that prevent us from becoming energy independent

rather than committing our military to another civil war in the Middle East where they will be fighting alongside the terrorists who attacked us 12 years ago and hate us.

A filibuster would be magnificant. But for it to be a political victory would require making it a standing filibuster - talking about the many ways that this proposed resolution could lead to our national security being threatened, terrorism being enabled, etc. This is a rare opportunity to lay it on the line about how Obaba and the party of international terror will destroy the United States.

This is the path followed by the Left: rule by mob. Whomever is the loudest carries the day.

____________________________

We are already ruled by mob, bullies and totalitiarians. If we don’t show some size and force, history will say of us as Solzenitzen said:

And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand? The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt!

Solzhenitsyn

AND:

How is that people who have been crushed by the sheer weight of slavery and cast to the bottom of the pit can nevertheless find the strength to rise up and free themselves, first in spirit and then in body; while those who soar unhampered over the peaks of freedom suddenly lose the taste for freedom, lose the will to defend it, and, hopelessly confused and lost, almost begin to crave slavery.

Rand is kind of a grandstander. I’d be more convinced of his intentions if he said what kind of military action that he would endorse (not Syria specifically).

If I recall correctly he is an isolationist and while we dont need to be the world police, we also dont need to stick our head in the ground and pretend that the world has stopped because we arent looking anymore.

I agree with Paul that Kerry is making a show of consulting Congress. This is no more than theatre. It came about only because Cameron got his ass handed to him by the House of Commons. Fortunately for Kerry he really doesnt have to stand and deliver, knowing that the opposition has more than a few minutes to shred his arguments.

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